Chapter 1

I was born on October the 20th in the year 1918 and then a little after my twentieth birthday my Uncle Lamb passed away, he was the only family I had since my parents passed away in a car accident when I was five. So afterwards, I felt a little lost so my boyfriend at the time, Frank Randall, who was an historian, invited me to come take a tour of the french countryside just outside of Paris with him in an attempt to cheer me up.

While I was there, there was one day when I went exploring by myself to study some plants that were there for I had recently taken up botany as a hobby so one afternoon while Frank was spending some time studing old history records with a collegue I went out to a small meadow to take a look at some of the plants I could find there when I came across a small cave and went inside and the closer I got to the end of the cave I started hearing this strange ringing and then I touched the back wall and the world suddenly went mad for a moment.

I must have passed out for I woke up on the floor of the cave and slowly got up and made my way out madly looking around as though sensing something was wrong. When I got out of the cave and looked around and saw that I wasn't alone there a short distance away was now a man there who looked like a frog dressed in what seemed to be mid-eighteenth century clothing with a modest powdered wig and a green waistcoat with a dark green suit to match and a dark-skinned woman who was also wearing in eighteenth century dress, more modest as though they were work clothes.

The man spoke then "Do not be afraid, Madonna, I know you have travelled from a long way away."

"What do you mean?" I asked confused, feeling that he didn't just mean my coming to France.

He then came closer toward me and gave me a courtly bow and introduced himself and his lady friend "Beg your pardon, Madonna, my name is Master Raymond and this is Delphine, my associate," he then held out his left arm toward me obviously expecting me to take it and continued talking gently probably trying not to scare me "If you'll come with us we'll show you want I mean."

I looked between Master Raymond and Delphine but not seeing much of a choice I took his arm and let him lead to away from the meadow with Delphine walking behind us we walked a while but I soon recognised the way we were going we then stopped at the top of this hill which I knew over looked Paris but when I looked down over the city I thought I might pass out again. It almost wasn't the same city, the Eiffel Tower was missing and they were carriages and horses instead of cars and even though it was starting to get dark they were no electric lights shining from any of the buildings.

I then slowly backed away from Master Raymond and asked frantically "What...Where the bloody hell am I?"

Master Raymond who had turned around and watched me concerned came toward me again and told me slowly "You're in Paris, Madonna, in the year 1736."

Two Years Later

I had changed so much since I first came here, of course the minute my mind accepted my fall through time I immediately wanted to go back but when we went back to the cave it no longer worked. Master Raymond then explained to me that the 'places' where the portals lay only worked at certain times and I would have to wait if I wanted to go back home. In the meantime Master Raymond had taken me in and let me work with him and Delphine in his apothecary shop and the more time I spent here the less I missed my own time. After a while I realised that to be honest there wasn't really that much for me to go back to, except maybe Frank but the two of us had not been happy for a long time and I could only hope that he'd been able to move on and forget about me by now.

Over the two years I had stayed here Master Raymond, Delphine and I had become very good friends and while they were still things about my modern day life that I missed like warm baths and indoor plumbing I felt like this time is where I was supposed to be for I had gained so much wisdom and knowledge from our work together. Then half a year ago Master Raymond suggested that I try volunteering at L'Hôpital des Anges, the charity hospital near Notre Dame cathedral and once I settled in there I had found a purpose and fully become what I wanted to be, a healer in fact I have gained quite a reputation that quite a few of my patients and our customers had taken to calling me 'La Dame Blanche' which means the white lady.

But I suppose the real story here started on a day almost like every other day, when I was in the back of the shop sorting out various herbs and supplies when I heard the bell on the shop door jingle telling me that someone had just come in and then a familiar female voice call for me, "Claire! Claire! Are you here? I have something exciting to tell you!."

Hearing the voice I felt my face give an amused half smile, it as Louise de La Tour, Marquise de Rohan she had become a good friend of mine ever since I personally saw to her recovery from an minor illness a month or so ago which apparently made her eternally grateful, Louise did tend to have a flair for the dramatic.

I quickly wiped my hands on the apron I was wearing and came out to greet her. I knew whatever it was that she had come to tell me it was important, or at least important to Louise, because she almost never came to the shop herself usually she would just send a servant to invite me to her house for tea or something like that.

Seeing me Louise's grin wided and she gave me a quick peck on both of my cheeks as soon as I was front of her and then repeated herself saying, "Claire, I have something exciting to tell you."

This made me laugh and say honestly "Yes, I heard."

"Oui, of course but this is exciting, you see I have just been invited to a party at Versailles in two weeks time." She explained.

"Oh, well that's...nice." I answered cautiously not really sure why she rushed over here to tell me this.

Seeing this Louise quickly added in "Oh, and I want you to come with me."

I was quite shocked by this, then feeling eyes on us looked behind me to see Master Raymond who to my horror seemed quite entertained by this idea I turned my attention back to Louise and started to say, "Thank you Louise, but I don't think I have anything that would be appropriate."

At this Louise simply waved her hand in the air in dismissal and tell me, "No need to worry about that I'll make you an appointment with my personal dressmaker, she'll make you a dress fit for a queen."

Seeing my still dubious expression she continued on with, "And I know there will be many rich single gentlemen for you to meet while we are there."

If that was to make this entrance into the french court a more attractive idea to me it failed miserably. Ever since we became friends Louise had felt it was her duty to find me a rich husband like sometimes when she invited me for tea one of her other friends would conveniently bring along their single brother or cousin or some sort of relative who would be seated next to me, for me to talk to. Although if that was Louise's main plan in bringing me along to Versailles I seriously doubted any of the King of France's inner circle would be seriously interested in me but I had to admit my own social standing was a little unclear, my spoken english sounded much too good and I was too well educated to be considered one of the 'peasants' but I did more or less work for a living but the money Master Raymond, Delphine and I earned from the shop was enough to afford our own carriage and dress me up in fashionable attire whenever Louise invited me over to her home for tea or house parties.

But back to the point at hand I then tried to give the excuse that I had too much work to do but for some reason Master Raymond promptly killed off that way out by happily saying, "Nonsense Madonna, you should go and have fun you work too hard," and turned to Louise assuring her "And please Milady I'll happily to be the one to pay the bill for Claire's new dress."

Louise just as promptly jumped on this and said, while heading towards the door, "Wonderful, but no need I'll take care of it, and Claire I'll have my manservant pick you up tomorrow at noon so we can go have your new dress made."

"But..." I tried to add in still trying to think of something else I could use to get out of this.

"Au revoir."

And with a slam and jingle of the store door she was gone and turned to give Raymond the darkest look I could muster, which only made him laugh and say "Well it's true Madonna, you do work too hard you should go out and enjoy a good party."

Seeing that I was well and truly defeated I let out a low breath and growled out "Fine, but never again." Then decided to return to the back room to finish my work when I just heard Delphine mutter, I'm still not sure if she meant for me to hear it, "Whatever you say ma chérie."